Shhhhh! Don't Say It Out Loud!

Two days, people. Two days.

This is the obligatory Birthday post, and I'm hoping that since I'm posting it early, it will be out of the way, and so will all that crappy, vomiting, sparking appliance karma will just fly right by me.

I have to work, and we have made absolutely no special plans. There are no new appliances (although I did have to have my windshield replaced today) so I'm hoping there are no surprises, no explosions of any kind, and that I can breeze through this in clean clothes and unscathed.

Pray for me to escape!

Finding Jesus

Yet again today, I got Jesus-ified.

For some reason, people I do not know (and in all honesty, have no desire to know) hand me Jesus tracts--the more I smile, the happier I am at work, the more likely it is that I will be given God's love in a convenient 4 paragraph package.

Today's message was about how kittens and puppies and babies love to be hugged. And God loves me! After being informed that said Jesus-ifiers were ducks, due to the rain, and after I declined the very polite offer to buy his umbrella for $40. (The most amazing part? I was INSIDE--not out in the rain, when the umbrella offer came.)

I do not understand the whole Jesus tract gig: are you obligated to hand them out only people who seem happy? When I am miserable, when there are flames shooting out orafice, when Satan himself is plaguing my every breath, these people and their messages of hugging kittens is nowhere to be found. When I could actually use these things, I don't get them. Is there a secret decoder ring necessary for figuring out the hows and whys of these things?

I remember once getting handed one in the ladies room while at work, too. I don't get how that was supposed to be helpful.

And now that I mention that...I recall the guy, 2 years ago, who gave me the one telling me I was going to Hell. I was happy and smiling that day, too.

Oh, I get it now. Never mind.

Ring! Ring!

How may I direct your call?

Yes. Hello. Uhm, I need, well, I don't know if, I mean, I called to find out, uhm, er, uhm, do you carry, uhm, yes. I don't know if you know, but, er, uhm, yeah, I mean, uhm, hot water tanks.

Later, that same day:
RING! RING!

How may I direct your call?

Uhm, OH! Hi. I'm looking for, and I need, uhm, you know. I want a price on a, can you tell me, and uhm, er, uhm, this other store, and you know. I have a question about stuff. What department is that?

Later, that same day:
RING! RING!

PTA Update

I'm not on the board. I did keep the newsletter, and I will be doing more in the fundraising department, and the Howler insisted that I fill out the paper and volunteer to do the Homeroom Parent gig. Dunno yet about the HR parent gig, but regardless, they haven't gotten rid of me yet (and I don't think they've figured out that they really, no really, should want to.)

Anyway, UberDad, who went batshit crazy last spring, has up and quit everything. He's not involved AT ALL, and won't even come to a meeting. Why? Because he want batshit crazy, and instead of just pretending it didn't happen--as most people in polite society will do in a situation like this--he's decided to hide out, and pretend he didn't know any of us at all.

I believe it was totally Freudian when he slipped and said, "You play this role, and I'll play this role, and we can fuck." He was, indeed, looking for a fuck, but he was most definitely asking the wrong question of the wrong person (and seriously, this is a line that works for him? Seriously? If you knew the details, you'd be shocked.)

I mean, yes, he basically fucked himself, but I don't think that was quite the ride he was looking for either.

Opposite Day

Ever have one of those days where everything you thought you knew was the opposite of what it was?

Yeah, well, I'm having a year of that, and it's depressing. At first, it was funny (okay, very funny) and then it freaked me out. Now, it's just depressing, because I'm all "WTF now?"

There's a reason I don't like people, and this is really really really a good example of why. Is there a reason that I'm sudden being dumped on in this way? I mean, was I too happy, or too content? It can't be because I'm a mean bitch, because I'm less mean and not as bitchy, unless, of course, you come up to me wearing a homemade Kick Me sign.

And if you're one of the pod people reading this, please talk amongst yourselves and set up some sort of system that lets everyone have a turn at screwing with my head, but doesn't make it feel like you're all batshit crazy with the full moon.

WTFriday

Didn't happen on a Friday, but I'm posting it now, so suck it up.

The other day at work, I had the most interesting customers, and am not the least bit surprised to discover that they are married to each other.

My first encounter was with Tree Woman. I had a few trees to mark down, and she came out, ooh'd and aaah'd over them. Then she told me, "My husband is coming up here to look at these. If someone else tries to buy them before he does, don't let them, okay."

After I managed to pick my jaw up off the floor, I had to tell her, "I'm sorry. I can't refuse to sell something like that. If you want to pick one or two of them to hold for him to see, I can do that, but I can't tell another customer they can't buy something that's out on the floor for sale." She looked at me like I'd taken a swing at her.

A short while later, Blueberry Man came up, and in the middle of another customer's sale, he leans on the counter and asks who can make a decision on reducing something? I tell him that she's not available right now, and I'll try and find someone when I'm done with the transaction. While he's leaning way into my personal space, sucking up other people's transaction time, an older lady comes up and demands that "nobody came" to help her, even though I've called and paged already. I tell her I'm trying to get someone for her. (It was that kind of day...I think every one turned off their phones because they were too stressed from being short-staffed and overworked/overdemanded) Blueberry Man isn't backing up and he's not moving over. Every time I tried to call that special someone to come up and talk to him, he began talking to me too. And so did the old woman. I finally had to tell both of them that I was trying to get them help (although, in all honesty, not the professional help they both so seriously needed) and could I please make this phone call to get it?

Gawdawful.

Finally, Blueberry Man shows up at the register to check out. He won't get out of my way to scan stuff, and again, when calling to get the prices adjusted, he talked when I talked. So I had to keep repeating myself before the person who needed to come could hear what I needed from them.

He had also swapped some of the plants in the fancy-schmancy planters and couldn't understand why I wouldn't ring up one item as another.

As he was paying, the rest of his party arrived--you betcha, it was the Tree Woman, and no, I wasn't the least bit surprised.

Trolling the Neighborhood

Apparently, my BFN (best friend neighbor) has decided, again, that she's going to make a play for My Sweetie.

We say that, because yesterday, when I got home from work, the Urchins were up to play with the Howler. And Waif, I guess, had the secret squirrel mission to try and get my Sweetie down to their house. Even after I got home.

We believe that a few years ago, BFN & Loser Boy were the ones to spread the rumors that various neighbors were engaged in illicit adult activities--and that I was the one keeping track of all the children so that the adult hi-jinks could go on. My Sweetie was mentioned sparingly in the rumors, but his name did come up some. I know that these rumors were simply rumors--untrue and very crass (and believe me, I know crass & vulgar.)

This past spring, she made the same attempt, with the same "excuse." She wanted to talk to my Sweetie about her garden. She called and kept him on the phone once for about an hour--yapping on and on about her pretend garden and that she expected My Sweetie to call her when HE went to get his tomatoes, etc, so SHE could go with HIM.

After the crap she was spreading through the neighborhood about my daughter (that the Howler was a vandal and that I was unbalanced) and my 2 hours conversation with her about how Loser Boy doesn't hit her with his fists, and that the 10 year old Waif would know when to call 911 if he ever got "truly out of hand," My Sweetie totally blew her off (not that he had any intention of calling her or going anywhere with her, anyway.)

She didn't call here, nor did she show up. Not even when I was not here.

Yesterday, Waif started telling the Howler to help get her daddy to go down to talk to her Mom about her garden. I'm guessing that this genius in a 40DD bra doesn't understand that it's September, and her pretend garden doesn't need anything now.

The Waif tried to get My Sweetie to go down there herself. The Waif told me that My Sweetie needed to go down to her house to talk to her mom about the garden.

I told the Waif that not only was it our suppertime--we weren't going--but that if her mom needed to talk to US about her garden, she could come up here.

Haven't heard a peep from her, not last night; not today. Go figure.

Newsflash

Yesterday, the entire world--at least, the center of it: my hometown--was without cellphone service from a major carrier. A goodly number of the people I work with, of all ages and levels of self-importance, were literally adrift and angry about it. (Apparently said major carrier's technical mechanic guy killed over a dozen towers in our service area.)

Several of those co workers were blathering on about how they were missing important emergency information/texts/calls. One woman was majorly pissed because her daughter MIGHT miss a day's work because she couldn't get the call to go to work. (First, they miss the point that it's a great big ol' IF they tried to call her; Second, Mama was gonna call to "take care of it" for her baby girl. In my opinion, but if she's big girl enough to be a substitute teacher, she's a big enough girl to take care of her own cellphone problems. Mama needs to get a hobby.)

Well, as the day went on, the service still wasn't fixed. The ranting cooled a bit, but I kept hearing about the "emergencies" that these people were missing. Things like a text from a friend regarding whether or not she was breaking up with her boyfriend, the call from the ol' boyfriend on whether or not he wiped his own ass, blah blah blah.

Seriously, these people don't realize what an emergency really is: Emergencies are about the loss of limbs, copious blood loss, bodily mangling, and death. NOT about whether or not we're partying tonight.

Then there were those who were "trying to run a business here." Really? Wow. Nobody in the history of America ever tried to run a business with telephone service out! Honest! Decades before cellphones and computers, landline telephone service would occasionally go out--things like lines going down, transformers being blown, etc, would cause service to go out...and get this! Business continued! And few people got pissed off enough to make idiotic statements like "They OWE me service!"

Sure, you pay for cellphone service, but accidents happen. Your not being connected to 15,000 other people will, barring some bizarre and ironic incident, NOT kill any of you. Especially not the for the 12-24 hours you are without your service. Big Shocker, that. They'll still be where they are, and you'll still be where you are. Worse case scenario, your Farmville farm will still be there, and your insecure, needy friends will manage to survive without your constant input.

Chances are pretty good that you'll all still be the self-centered, self-important people you have been all this time, too.

This Little Piggy...

Ain't no piggy. No how. No way.

I don't care that you tell me the story about breakfast: it's a day's work for the ol' chicken, but a life commitment for the lil' piggy. I don't care how creative you are in making that lil' metaphor be about working in Retail Hell. I don't care how it relates to being Flypaper for Freaks.

And, I seriously do not appreciate being called a pig--no matter how managerially you meant it, no matter how well you tell that stupid story.

No matter what you promise, I know that your promise will Fail me, so, "uh, hell NO, I am not a pig."

"Oh, Spongebob, WHY?!"

Thursday I was in Hell. Okay, so it was really the returns desk, but it seemed like Hell. (Everything that could go wrong, did; and I spent time having to ask repeatedly to get the simplest things I needed. It was very like working there when we first opened, but I digress)



At one point in my less than lovely day, Mrs Puff, from the Nickelodeon cartoon Spongebob Squarepants, came in with a return.

source

While processing her return, the phone began to ring. After each ring, Mrs Puff said, "HELLO!" The phone rang at least 3 times.